


This one's for we two

by Trojie



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Depressed Dean, Depression, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Inspired by Music, Protective Sam Winchester
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-10
Updated: 2013-12-10
Packaged: 2018-01-04 07:14:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 904
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1078100
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Trojie/pseuds/Trojie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam knows Dean gets low sometimes, knows he puts the whole damn world before himself most days. About the only thing left Dean will do for himself is pick the music, so Sam shuts his cakehole.</p>
            </blockquote>





	This one's for we two

**Author's Note:**

> For my 2013 hc_bingo card, prompt 'depression'. The album that features so heavily in this fic is 'Presence' by Led Zeppelin - the one mentioned at the end is 'Bad Company' by Bad Company. Both are worth a listen!

Sam's pretty sure a psychiatrist would call it depression, the way Dean gets sometimes. Not that Dean would ever go to a psychiatrist with the intention of actually telling the truth, actually looking for help for himself for once rather than faking it to help someone else, but if he did, Sam's pretty sure they'd say he was depressed. He goes grey, dull and functional, or not even functional - fog, not steel. He goes through the motions. Sam's no shrink, but he's all Dean's got, and that's his best guess. 

Sam tries to go easier, days when Dean's low. Tries not to react when Dean pushes at his buttons, but it's hard. He's not exactly the most balanced person in the world either. Sometimes they just rub each other the wrong way. But he tries. And that means he shuts his cakehole when Dean picks music, because it's something Dean will do for himself, just because he wants to. 

Some days it goes like this - tape in the cassette player, and Sam shivers with the windows rolled up as Robert Plant's wounded-dog whine tells him _it was an April morning when they told us we should go_. He hates this album. He read once they recorded it after Plant was in a car accident, and it just seems like too much of an ill omen, he doesn't like it when Dean sings along _\- heard a cry for mercy in the city of the damned, down in the pits you go no lower, the next stop's underground, wine and roses ain't quite over, fate deals a losing hand, and I said, didn't mean to fail, didn't mean to fail -_ because it hits too close. 

Some days it goes like this, when Dean's all tunnel-vision, white-line hypnotised and foot rolling against the gas pedal, caressing like he's trying to get the car off rather than get somewhere, other arm shifting between stick-shift and the back of the seat, and he's crooning like the words he's saying _\- trying to save my soul tonight, it's nobody's fault but mine -_ are a plea. 

Dean's not the cry for help type. Dean's just singing along and Sam doesn't have to listen if he doesn't want to. But just the same, Sam's all Dean's got and Dean's singing's all the hint Sam gets some days. Windows down and AC/DC belting, all's right with the world - rain on the windshield and the latter days of Led Zeppelin is something else. 

Track changes. Dean sighs. Sam eases closer. 

This album jars, shifts between blues-plaintive and forced-upbeat, and it's Dean all over. Syncopate and bounce and _the sun in my soul's sinking lower, while the hope in my hands turns to clay_ is somehow the jauntiest thing Sam's ever heard and Dean's eyes are grey-green and rainwashed, all at once. God, Sam just wishes they could stop the world for a day, wishes he could give Dean something to show him there's more to living than finding a meaningful way to die.

'Hey,' Sam says when he sees a sign for a rest-stop coming up. 'You want me to take over for a while? You must be beat, man, you've been driving since we woke up.'

They're in a hurry, see, apocalypse don't wait for no man, and Dean … he's burning through himself trying to keep up. But Sam's not sure they're in so much of a hurry that he can't take the wheel, if only Dean will let him. Dean flicks a look at him, sidelong. He's been whiteknuckling the steering wheel so long he'll be cramping in his fingers by the time they stop for the night, if they stop for the night. Sam holds his breath. _Hey babe, hey babe, I lost my way -_ Robert Plant pleads in the background _\- hey babe, I don't know where I'm gonna find it -_

Dean bumps the indicators, and Sam breathes out. 

They stop near a picnic table and a sad, dying little tree, and Sam gets out and goes round, lets Dean slide across the seat. 

It's always a weird feeling, the first few moments in the driver's seat. It's Dean's seat. But it's warm and Dean blinks at him and sort of exhales and softens into the puddle of leather that marks the place Sam has worn into Dean's baby over the years. 

Sam puts the car into gear and shifts her up and back onto the blacktop, back up to speed. Mile markers flash and Dean tips his head back and murmurs the blues. _How come twenty four hours sometimes slips into days? A minute seems like a lifetime, baby, when I feel this way._

The tape runs out eventually. Seven songs like seven sins and it always seems to take forever to spin down clicking to the reel, but the last notes die out and Dean breathes, breathes deep and even.

The next tape isn't exactly AC/DC, but it's better. The hollow look in Dean's eyes is softer when Sam glances in the rearview mirror, and he mouths _you give me somethin' I need, now tell me I got somethin' for you -_ and looks away and smiles. Sam knows he can't fix what ails his brother - can't stitch this one up - but he can do this, and if he's lucky, he can at least make Dean smile for a moment.

Thank god, some days it still goes like this.


End file.
